By the end of 2023, the total number of registered individual businesses in Zhejiang province reached 6.69 million, accounting for 64.67 percent of the total operating entities and marking a year-on-year growth of 10.64 percent, according to the Zhejiang Provincial Market Supervision Bureau.

Throughout the year, 15,668 outstanding innovative individual businesses were cultivated, and 21,600 individual businesses were transformed into enterprises, a year-on-year increase of 14.34 percent

By the end of 2023, there were 181,800 individual businesses engaged in the primary industry, 800,900 in the secondary industry, and 5.7 million in the tertiary industry, data from the bureau shows. In other words, over 80 percent of individual businesses operate in the tertiary industry (service industry).

The data also indicates that more than 80 percent of daily resident service outlets and more than 90 percent of agricultural markets and wholesale markets are operated by individual businesses.

Meanwhile, emerging industries are developing rapidly, with scientific research and technology service industries growing by 35.73 percent, information transmission, software, and information technology service industries growing by 30.88 percent, and culture, sports, and entertainment industries growing by 35.01 percent.

The average number of employees per individual business in Zhejiang is 2.08, meaning they employ a total of 13.9 million people, accounting for about 30 percent of the province's employed population, said the bureau.